Because you use your hands for so much in life, there are all kinds of ways to injure them. For Jaine Andrews, her problems began with a trip to the grocery store.
“I grabbed six of those plastic grocery bags thinking I could carry them with my left hand,” she said. “I found out I can’t. And so when a bag slipped out of my hand, I felt it pop and I thought, ‘Well, that’s not good.’”
The next day her hand was swollen, and she couldn’t make a fist. When the swelling and discomfort persisted for two weeks after a walk-in Sanford clinic visit, she made an appointment to see Hao Li, M.D., a hand surgery specialist at Sanford Orthopedics and Sports Medicine in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.
Andrews, executive producer of KELOLAND Living, was a candidate for WALANT (wide-awake local anesthesia no tourniquet) surgery, a procedure that delivers as advertised by using only local anesthesia (lidocaine), with the patient able to go home after a surgery that in many cases takes less than a half-hour to complete.
Quick surgery, fast recovery
Andrews’ symptoms indicated she had a tendon issue. As Dr. Li explained to her, this surgery would involve a small incision, followed by a simple repair of the affected tendon. The inconvenience of general anesthesia – things like fasting in the hours before surgery, finding someone to drive you home after surgery, post-op grogginess – would be avoided.
“I always tell people the surgery doesn’t change,” Dr. Li said. “You get the same surgery whether we do it here in the clinic with wide-awake local anesthesia or with general anesthesia. The main differences for wide awake surgery are the logistics for you in terms of planning and how quickly you can recover right after surgery.”
Andrews’ procedure was much less invasive than it would have been decades earlier, which translates to more efficient and thorough healing. In this case, she didn’t miss a day of work.
“We want our patients to try to use the hand as quickly as possible because that usually means a speedy recovery and more functional hand,” Dr. Li said. “Historically, we used to put people in a cast for a long time, but we found that peoples’ hands were getting stiff and it took longer for them to get good motion of their hand.”
Not making the same mistake
Andrews spends hours at a time at the keyboard at KELO. When she noticed some nerve pain a few weeks after the procedure, she wondered whether she was asking too much of her repaired hand. Another visit with Dr. Li fixed that.
“He looked at my hand and knew right away what I needed,” Andrews said. “He gave me a little Velcro splint to put around my affected finger and my index finger and that solved the problem completely. Other than that, it’s all healed.
“I still baby it a little bit because I’m scared to make the same mistake – I don’t want to carry too many grocery bags in one hand again. That was the stupidest thing ever.”
With more precise diagnosis earlier in the healing process, Dr. Li could recommend a more robust recovery schedule. That will soon include pickleball for Andrews, who anticipates signing up for a fall league.
Hand problems where Sanford can help
You don’t need to wait until you start dropping bags of groceries to seek out the kind of surgery Andrews received. Those suffering pain, stiffness, numbness or weakness can often restore or preserve function of their hands via surgical or nonsurgical treatment.
Sanford Health’s orthopedic specialists don’t recommend surgery until you’ve exhausted other avenues, such as wearing a splint, taking medication or doing therapy.
Sanford offers treatments for these conditions:
- Osteoarthritis
- Carpal tunnel
- Hand infections
- Lumps on the hands or wrists (ganglion cysts)
- Nerve compression syndromes
- Permanently bent fingers (Dupuytren’s contracture)
- Tendonitis
- Trauma
- Trigger finger
- Tumors
- Wrist pain
“Our hands are great in that there’s so much ability for healing,” Dr. Li said. “But when you have a cut where you can’t move your finger, you can’t bend it or you can’t straighten it, that could be a sign that there’s a tendon injury.”
Making the right decision
Spearheaded by the efforts of hand surgeon Robert Van Demark, Jr., M.D., Sanford Health has established itself as a smart and popular choice for people who want to fix problems with their hands. The surgeons at Sanford have done more than 6,000 WALANT procedures since 2013.
For Andrews, making the decision to have the procedure was an easy one. She could have worn a brace on her hand for another month or so in hopes that by continuing to limit her activity she would alleviate symptoms. There were no assurances, however, that additional time in a brace would eliminate the need for surgery.
It seemed like a better idea to find out exactly what is going on now, Andrews thought, and then get it repaired if need be.
“I was surprised by how simple it was to fix it and how short the recovery was,” she said. “I haven’t been out of work once. I feel like it’s getting stronger every day.”
Find an orthopedic surgeon
Sometimes, all it takes to relieve hand or wrist pain is therapy or activity modifications. If you do need surgery to correct injuries, Sanford Health board-certified orthopedic surgeons can help you.
Learn more
- ‘Wide awake’ hand surgery lets patients skip the OR
- Wrist clinical trial hopes to heal with stem cell therapy
- Injured far from the clinic? What to do first
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Posted In Orthopedics, Sioux Falls, Sports Medicine
